IPKeys, a provider of smart grid communications technology, has announced the successful conclusion of multi-phase pilots at PJM Interconnection for ancillary services, including synchronous reserve (SR) and regulation, utilizing its OpenADR 2.0b-certified Energy Interop Server & System (EISS).

OpenADR is a standardized method for electricity providers and system operators to communicate demand response signals. EISS is an automated two-way information and communication system designed to deliver interoperable market signals to wholesale and retail consumers and their energy management systems and devices via Web services.

According to IPKeys, the pilot participants - Walmart, PJM, Lawrence Berkley National Laboratory and Schneider Electric - succeeded in showing the technological feasibility of using the OpenADR 2.0b profile in the field for ancillary services and regulation signaling.

Walmart provided a signaling test bed at one of its stores in Pennsylvania as part of the pilot's SR phase. IPKeys reports that it translated the PJM SR Web service signal into an appropriate OpenADR 2.0b service message to successfully initiate a series of lighting and HVAC loads via Walmart's building management system solution.

"This highly secure technology enables energy consumers, such as Walmart, to receive actionable open-standard and machine-interoperable market signals through an isolated interface directly from [independent system operators] and begin the process of automating participation in ancillary services and other rapid response markets," comments Robert Nawy, managing director and chief financial officer at IPKeys.

In the regulation phase of the pilot program, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, Schneider Electric provided a signaling test bed in its variable frequency drive laboratory in Raleigh, N.C. IPKeys notes that its work on this phase concerned translation of PJM regulation signals into appropriate OpenADR 2.0b Web service messages.

"We have demonstrated that it is possible to perform four-second regulation using secure Web services," remarks Jim Boch, senior electrical engineer and EISS product manager at IPKeys. "This capability dramatically reduces the cost and complexity barriers for loads to participate in regulation markets when compared to dedicated DNP3 or ICCP links."

Months after the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency released its Clean Power Plan, which will create new regulations for existing power plants, the agency says it has received loads of feedback to consider.